Love Never Fails

At this time in history, when so much prophecy is breaking out to fruition, when many friends and family are passing away and the prophetic comes out for readiness, I can’t help but feel a quiet anticipation, joy and fulfillment that the time is near, or here, that the perfection is about to come, the time of completeness. Jesus is about to return for His Bride and all the things that seemed so important will fall away when He comes in His completeness. Like the Hebrew marriage, we are betrothed to Him and He has gone to prepare the wedding chamber, and when complete He will return for His Bride. And that would be us, we who love Him. Today is Pentecost Sunday (not Pentecost for the sake of my detractors) When we celebrate God’s outpouring and Gift of the baptism of the Holy Spirit and power.

Love never fails. That’s what 1 Corinthians 13 tells us and that should pretty much be all you should take from it. Some people use it, abuse it, pretend it portends the end of an era past, the end of something. Many use it as an excuse to decry and condemn those that actually believe the Bible and in the Holy Spirit, contributing to an error doctrine that puts intellectual interpretation above the Holy Spirit. Arrogant people who can’t humble themselves before God and accept the indwelling of His Holy Spirit. They make fun of, abuse and ridicule that which they don’t understand. Warnings were made in the book of Jude:

In the very same way, these dreamers pollute their own bodies, reject authority and slander celestial beings…Yet these men speak abusively against whatever they do not understand…In the last days there will be scoffers who follow their own ungodly desires. These are men who follow mere natural instincts and do not have the Holy Spirit.

Love never fails. One has to understand the letters to the Corinthians. These people excelled in the gifts of the Holy Spirit and they were a Megachurch, if you will. But they were getting out of hand and Paul had to address it. One guy had his fathers wife, they were turning the Communion into party time and worship services were disruptive. And on top of all this, they were arrogant toward the other churches because the Spirit was more active there. The much abused and misused text from 1 Corinthians 13:8-12 :

8 Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away.9 For we know in part and we prophesy in part,10 but when completeness comes, what is in part disappears.11 When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put the ways of childhood behind me.12 For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.

Many use this text to prove that the gifts of the Holy Spirit are done because the completion (perfection) has come which they claim is the KJV bible. Paul didn’t know about any coming bible, he wasn’t referring to a bible. He was referring to the return of Christ, the perfection, when He will restore the order of things to perfection. Until then, we NEED the counselor, the power of God because man’s reasoning is always, until then, depraved. It’s sad, Paul was writing to admonish the arrogance of the super spiritual yet now it’s used, by men too arrogant to humble themselves before God, as a tool of hate and derision. Truly these men, in their reasoning, have missed the point, that love never fails and the greatest of these is love.

I'm a musician and worship leader, intent on following wherever God leads and directs me, with His leading's in the Spirit and others bonking me on the head ( hopefully not much of the latter).
My life experiences are in blue collar and white collar (engineering) employment, political office, lay ministries, national competition in track and cross country and most importantly marriage and raising a family. God has given me a unique set of skills and character to serve Him and a passion for doing it.

6 thoughts on “Love Never Fails”

Right on! I have never understood how any clear thinking person can use these scriptures to argue cessationism. You have to argue against the precedent of Scripture and history while also throwing out the context. It’s much easier just to believe what the Word says. :) But I guess if anyone thinks “the perfect” has already come, then I really don’t mind if they wanna stay with *this* perfect while I believe for a better (and biblical) perfect. :) He is coming soon!

So also, have we wondered after hearing him declare that Jesus didn’t die for everyone. He goes on to declare that Jesus only died for those predestined. How sad it would be if he were to have so watered down scriptures that one day he wakes up and finds himself in the position of Charles Templeton. I pray, for his sake, that would not happen.